genius and scourge. The greatest misfortune
that can befall a man is to be deprived of burial. In such a case his
spirit, deprived of a resting-place and of the funerary libations, leads a
wandering and miserable existence; he is exposed to all kinds of
ill-treatment at the hands of his fellow spirits, who show him no mercy."

Here we find certain elements of that primitive belief that would escape us
in a mere examination of the Chaldaean tombs. We see how they understood the
connection between the living and the dead, and why they so passionately
desired to receive due sepulture. These ideas and sentiments are identical
with those which M. Fustel de Coulanges has analysed so deeply in his _Cite
antique_. They subsisted in all their strength in Assyria, and must have
had all the consequences, all the social effects that they had elsewhere,
and yet we find mentioned a home for the dead, a joyless country in which
they could assemble in their countless numbers; as Egypt had its _Ament_
and Greece her _Hades_, so Chaldaea and Assyria had their hell, their place
of departed ghosts. We know from the narrative of Istar that they looked
upon it as an immense building, situated in the centre of the earth and
bounded on every side by the great river whose waters bathe the foundations
of the world. This country of the dead is called the "land where one sees
nothing" (_mat la namari_), or the "land whence one does not return" (_mat
la tayarti_). The government of the country is in the hands of Nergal, the
god of war, and his spouse Allat, the sister of Astarte. The house is
surrounded by seven strong walls. In each wall there is a single door,
which is fastened by a bolt as soon as a new comer has entered. Each door
is kept by an incorruptible guardian. We cannot quote the whole of the
story; we give, however, a few lines in which the chief features of the
Assyrian conception is most clearly shown. Istar speaks:--

Let me return [toward the house],

* * * * *

[Toward] the house in which Irkalla lives,
In which the evening has no morning,
[Towards the country] whence there is no return,
[Whose inhabitants,] deprived of light,
[Have dust for food] and mud to nourish them,
A tunic and wings for vesture,
[Who see no day,] who sit in the shadows,
[In the house] into which I must enter,
[They live there,] (once) the wearers of crowns,
[The wearers] of